As promised, here are the spoils of my first year attending Maryland Sheep & Wool. 
I drove up with Laura and Lennis and we had a great time! But first, a sweet sheep for you:
I was so excited to see some sheep up close. This one was one of my favorites–look at that sweet face! There are a bunch more sheepy pics at my Flickr (and a couple of alpacas, too)!
Now, on to the yarn:
Miss Babs Yummy Sock & Baby Yarn – A Day at Blue Lagoon
Autumn House Farm Strideaway Velvet – Bracken & Gorse
Reflections at Roclans Out of the Dyepot – colorway 10-19
Tess’ Designer Yarns SuperSock & Baby – unknown colorway
Prior to going shopping, I had set a budget for myself and was surprised to come in under budget at the end of Saturday. I was focused on sock yarn since I’m really into socks again, and I also wanted to buy yarns that I couldn’t find locally or had never handled in person.
We got to the market around 9 AM on Saturday. It was fun walking around and seeing sheep before we bought anything–I even got to pet a sheep briefly, something I’ve been wanting to do for a long time. I’m really glad I had someone with me because I’m sure I would’ve gotten lost a couple times otherwise. We walked through a couple of the exhibition halls, but after a while, they all started to look the same to me. However, we all found plenty of yarn to buy, so I was happy.
The crowds weren’t too bad–some of the booths were kind of crazy and I tried to avoid those or come back to them later. At one point, I spotted Anne Hanson of Knitspot in the crowd, which was rather exciting for me since I really admire her patterns. I was too shy to say hello, though.
By 11:30, it was soooo hot outside and we were basically done shopping, so we ended up leaving around 11:45 because the heat was becoming unbearable. We had water bottles and sat in the shade to eat and watch the fashion show, but it was just really uncomfortable, so we left.
Saturday evening, we attended the Fiber Crawl after party. Long story short, there was a miscommunication between Guido (the party organizer) and the hotel, so we ended up on the deck outside and some people even had to sit at tables set up in the parking lot (and other people didn’t have chairs at all, so they had to stand for the whole party). It was kind of muggy out, so I was slightly miserable after having been out in the heat all morning, but we stayed until the party ended. Unfortunately, none of us won any prizes, but we still had a pretty nice time. If there is a party again next year, though, I don’t think I’ll go unless it’s held at a hotel other than the Hilton, since I don’t think we got our money’s worth for what they provided in return.
I spotted the Knitmore Girls at the after party and wanted to say hi, but every time I checked, they were always talking with someone and I didn’t want to interrupt or bother them, so I settled for the celebrity sighting, lol. oh, and at the market I ran into happyneedle from Ravelry and Twitter, who introduced herself to me, which was nice. I recognized a few other people from Ravelry by their name tags, but no one I knew well enough to introduce myself to. At the after party, somebunnyslove from Ravelry as well as Guido came over to our table, and they both seemed really nice.
Overall, MDS&W was definitely worth the trip and it was a fun experience. It’s amazing to see that many vendors and booths in one place–so many pretty yarns, so little time! There was a lot of roving, too. I think I was expecting system overload–like I’d see all this pretty yarn and snatch everything up and blow through my budget really fast, which totally didn’t happen.
Sooooo, I was glad when Laura suggested that we hit The Yarn Lounge in Richmond on our way back to Hampton Roads! I still had plenty of yarn money to spend, so while at The Yarn Lounge, I picked up these three lovelies:
Fleece Artist Nyoni – Ireland
Fleece Artist Merino 2/6 – Salt Spray
Malabrigo Sock – Azules
I should point out that I had been on a yarn diet since December, so I think the yarn diet was appropriately ended and broken in an epic manner the weekend of MDS&W. 
Lastly, I bought the following yarn online a few days ago because I didn’t have a chance to check it out at the festival and I had coveted Laura’s skein in a different colorway:
Wullenstudio Designer Yarns – Wooly Bully
As the weekend was my present to myself for finishing college, I’d say the trip as a whole was a success! We had lots of fun, took home plenty of yarn, and I definitely want to go back next year.
This will be my first time going and it’s doubly exciting because it’s my reward to myself to graduating college!
and then I have another paper that’s due on May 7. Originally they were both due this weekend, but mercifully, he extended the due date for the second paper. Yeah, I’ve got a paper due the night I come back from Maryland. But I’m going to work on it today and then finish it up Sunday night before turning it in. I freaked out about it at first, but now that I’ve got the other three classes behind me, I’m confident I can get it done.
